Category: Jakarta

Six people died and 10 went missing in a flood that hit Makassar City and six other districts in South Sulawesi on Tuesday. The previous day, dozens of houses and several bridges were destroyed hours after torrential rainfall hit. The six people were from Gowa district, which was inundated because of rising water levels in the Jenebarang River. Gowa Regent Adnan Purichta Ichsan said some of the victims died because of electric shock while others were buried by landslides. “We are continuing to evacuate and assist residents affected by the flood,” he said as quoted by Antara.…

As the Jakarta Police’s Electronic Traffic Law Enforcement (E-TLE) gains praise as an effective means of disciplining unruly motorists in the city, deputy National Police chief Comr. Gen Ari Dono Sukmanto has suggested an integration between the ticketing system and the electricity and water supply. He said that through the integration it would be possible for state electricity company PLN to cut off the electricity supply to traffic violators recorded in the police database. “We can [cooperate] with PLN and if the [violators] refuse to pay, they will have their…

JAKARTA – The biggest Asian Games in history opened on Saturday (Aug 18) night as Indonesia welcomed the continent’s top athletes to Jakarta and Palembang. At the capital’s Gelora Bung Karno Main Stadium, 40,000 spectators were entertained by an opening ceremony that featured cultural performances and pyrotechnics on a 120m-long stage, built manually by artists from Jakarta and Bandung, and in the shape of a towering mountain with a waterfall. The ceremony opened with a skit purportedly showing Indonesia President Joko Widodo doing stunts on a motorbike in Jakarta’s streets…

As a sociologist and media scholar with an interest in emerging forms of civic engagement, I initially came to Jakarta – the world’s Twitter capital – to research innovative social media uses. Instead, my first visits to an informal settlement near an estuary, Kampung Tongkol, in 2015 in North Jakarta, revealed something more hybrid: mixed-media participatory mapping of the settlement’s physical and socioeconomic infrastructure. They have also volunteered to partially remove their housing to make way for a road on the riverbank in the hope to avoid forced evictions, which usually happened…

Thousands of people participated in an anti-Jokowi walk on Sunday morning in the Gladag area in the city of Surakarta, Central Java. The event on Sunday was also attended by, among others, the Surakarta Sharia Council (DSKS) chairman Muinudinillah Basri, Muhammadiyah activist Mustofa B. Nahrawardaya and local figure Mudrick Sangidu. Earlier, the Surakarta Police said they did not permit the event because it had a potential to create altercations between President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo supporters and those who oppose him. In response, the event committee said they would prohibit the participants…

Bank Indonesia started on Monday to punish corporations or individuals who violate a Bank Indonesia regulation that limits the amount of of foreign banknotes that can be carried when crossing the Indonesian border. With the enforcement of Bank Indonesia Regulation (PBI) No. 20/2018 on the revision of PBI No. 19/7 2017, only licensed institutions – banks and money changing institutions – are allowed to carry more than US$1 million in banknotes. Violators of the regulation are required to pay a fine of up to 10 percent of the banknotes they carry, with the maximum fine set at Rp…

Now that all the players are in place for Indonesia’s 2019 presidential election, the reaction to a protest movement to unseat incumbent President Joko Widodo seems to portend a very heated campaign season between now and when votes are cast in April. The controversial #2019GantiPresiden (Replace The President in 2019) opposition movement was meant to hold a declaration rally in the East Java capital of Surabaya on Sunday, but one of the movement’s most high-profile participants, musician-cum-politician Ahmad Dhani met fierce opposition the day before the event when counter-protesters arrived at…

Workers install decorative lamps on a nylon net covering Sentiong River, which is also known as ‘kali item’ ( the black river) for its severe pollution, on July 24, to improve its appearance ahead of the Asian Games next month. (tribunjakarta.com/Gerald Leonardo Agustino) The Jakarta administration has decorated Sentiong River, also known as Kali Item (the black river) for its severe pollution, with colorful lamps after covering it with a black nylon net prior to the Asian Games next month. The river, which is located across the athletes village in Kemayoran, Central Jakarta, was covered by the net amid concerns that it…

CCTV footage shows an app-based motorcycle taxi passenger being robbed in Cempaka Putih, Central Jakarta, on Sunday. The 37-year-old was killed in the incident. (Via kompas.com/Instagram) The Jakarta Police deployed on Tuesday night 1,000 personnel to combat street crimes in the capital. Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Argo Yuwono said the operation would last until Aug. 3, while the personnel were divided into 16 teams —13 of which comprised personnel from police precincts, while the remaining three teams were from the Jakarta Police. “If there is resistance [from the muggers and…

JAKARTA — A high-profile Indonesian husband and wife have been sentenced to prison for swindling more than 60,000 Muslims out of about $65 million with a scam centered on pilgrimages to Mecca. A court outside Jakarta on Wednesday handed down a 20-year sentence to Andika Surachman and an 18-year term to his Muslim fashion designer wife, Anniesa Hasibuan. Her sister, Kiki Hasibuan, was sentenced to 15 years over the same scam. “The defendants … are proven guilty of committing [a] perpetual scam and money laundering,” judges at the court in the…